Practice Makes Perfect
by PokeyDotes
Summary: It's a solemn moment when you realize the thing you're the best at is killing people.
It's a solemn moment when you realize the thing you're the best at is killing people.

Kensi's looking through a sniper's scope, the crosshairs lining up with her target in such a way that she _knows_ she's got him, that all that's keeping his heart beating is the absence of an order to take the shot.

There's sweat beading on her back, irritating the skin just below her bra strap. Her elbows burn with the weight of her upper body, the knobby bones digging into the graveled earth in a way that can only be described as uncomfortable.

Yet, she doesn't move. She keeps her eyes locked on the man in the distance, her finger gently resting on the trigger should someone in charge decide to make a decision.

The wind is blowing. Not much, but enough for the shorter strands of hair to fall loose from her ponytail and tickle her cheek. Enough that she knows she has to adjust a few degrees for the bullet's trajectory.

Her team isn't talking to her. Not today when their main goal is to end a life. There's always that possibility, the knowledge that you may have to actually use the gun you've been given. But it's usually not a guarantee.

Bring the gun, know how to use it, and know where you're aiming. Point and pull. Maybe, but hopefully not. On those occasions, those days where there's a possibility they'll head home without firing a shot, there's always banter. Someone is trying to get under the other's skin, laughing at someone's expense. There's innuendos and exaggerations, with the occasional bluff.

But none of that's here today.

Two hours ago, Granger had given the order sent down from the Director himself. Locate and terminate. The U.S. wants the man dead, and the easiest way to do it is with a bullet rather than a trial.

She's read the dossier, she knows what this man's done, what he's suspected to have planned.

The risk is too great. That had been the underlying factor that determined the decision to have this man executed.

And that's what this is, an execution. Kensi had agreed, still does, just a little less ardently now that she's the executioner.

She's done this before. Numerous times. She's one of the best, that's why they count on her, why Owen Granger had looked right at her when he gave the command. And that is what's really bothering her.

She's good at it.

She doesn't enjoy it. Her entire life she's known there's danger to pursuing a career in law enforcement. The academy had made it crystal clear that she might have to take a life. They just weren't as clear on how often it might happen.

She's staring at the man through the scope, watching as he texts on his phone, as he whispers orders to his body guards. He'll be dead in a few moments. Unless the metaphorical governor calls at the last minute, this man with the sunburned nose and greying hair will be dead. She knows it, because she's good at what she does.

And that makes her sad. Plain and simple.

Her eyes burn, the unwanted tears temporarily blurring her vision through the scope, causing the image of the condemned to morph into a watery smudge before she blinks a few times, the tears slowly falling as they make their way towards her chin.

The worst part is this won't even be the first life she'll have taken today. That honor goes to the unnamed thug who had tried to shoot her first. It had been unexpected, an out of the blue kind of thing. Yet, she hadn't hesitated. As soon as the man had sent a few bullets her way, she had returned the favor. And she's good at what she does, so she got to walk away. He wasn't, so now he's dead.

She sniffs once, temporarily taking her eyes off her target as she pops her neck, adjusts her shoulders, and forces herself to focus.

Sam's on a hill not too far away, probably lying on the ground in the exact same position she is. She wiggles her feet, trying to keep the blood circulation up. The tips of her boots dig into the ground, that tingly feeling of sleeping extremities tickling its way down her shins to her toes.

"Visuals? Hanna?" Granger's gruff voice whispers in her ear, the plastic of the earwig vibrating, causing an itch which triggers a full body shiver.

"Negative," Sam responds, and she can hear the frustration in his voice. "Too many guards in my line. Shot's blocked."

"Blye?" Granger asks next, disregarding Sam and immediately focusing on Kensi.

"I got him," she whispers, never mind that the target can't hear her. She feels her throat tighten, as though she's on the verge of truly crying. She quickly pushes it down, swallowing hard and locking her jaw. She is a Federal Agent. A strong, disciplined fighter. She knows the rules, she understands the risks. And she knows perfectly well what could happen if this man is allowed to continue with his plans, if the knowledge that is in his head falls into the wrong hands.

A few tears still stubbornly, shamefully falling, she listens to Granger tell SWAT to get ready, waits a single, momentary beat when he gives the order, and then she fires.

It's quick. The man's body jerks, his face slacking in terminal shock as his phone falls to the ground a fraction of a second before he does.

She quickly empties her chamber, readies her gun, and finds a new target. She watches the chaos below, her scope hurriedly finding the biggest threats to her team. SWAT members take the lead, the more recognizable figures of Granger, Callen, and Deeks blending in with the swarm of Kevlar.

She doesn't count the seconds. She simply maintains her position, waiting for the all clear, waits for the team below to take control of the scene.

As soon as the last man is down, cuffs glinting in the California sun, she secures her rifle, turns her back to the scene, and wraps her arms around her knees.

She doesn't cry, at least no more than she already has.

"Kens? You good?" Deeks asks, the earwig once more tickling.

"I'm fine," she assures him. Knowing she can't hide forever, she wipes her dusty hands on her equally dusty jeans, hurriedly wipes away the tears, and prepares to leave.

She's half way down the hill when Sam joins her. The front of his clothes are covered in fine, red dust, his rifle slung across his back as he carefully makes his way down the rocky slope.

"You good?" he asks, echoing Deeks.

She gives him a familiar smile and a quick, "yep" before facing forward, her goal being to get to her car.

The next hour is spent securing the scene, making sure everyone involved is all on the same page, and that there aren't any extra bodies lying around. Despite her determination to act as though everything's okay and that she hadn't had a life altering realization atop a desert cliff, the others seem to pick up on her altered mood.

By the time they get the all clear to head home, her emotional exhaustion has begun to manifest into the physical.

Deeks, ever perceptive, gently grabs her wrist as she tries to open the driver door. Without a word, he takes the keys from her hand, kisses her temple, and pushes her in the direction of the passenger side. She keeps her eyes on the ground as she walks, not wanting to see if they have an audience or not.

She truly expects Deeks to interrogate her. She even has an argument ready, a quick "I'm fine. I really don't want to talk about it." But he simply cranks the car, adjusts the radio, and pulls out into the long line of dark SUVs leaving the scene.

They remain quiet all the way back to the city. They're about twenty minutes from the office when Deeks decides to change course. She watches as Sam's dust covered black car passes them by, continuing on without them.

"Where are we going?" Her voice cracks as she breaks the silence.

"Fast food," Deeks tells her, his head nodding to the nearest burger joint with a line of cars.

"I'm not hungry." And she isn't. The thought of food is decidedly unwanted.

Deeks pulls into the driveway anyway. He then pulls the earwig out of his ear, thumbnail sliding the power off before he drops it into the cup holder. He waits for Kensi to do the same and then asks, "Are you going to tell me what's bothering you?"

"Nothing's bothering me."

"We've known each other long enough that A) I can tell you're lying, and B) you know I'm not gonna let this go."

They just look at each other as Deeks pulls forward in line, the window slowly rolling down.

The stare down is broken as a bored teenage voice crackles through the speaker. "Can I take your order?"

Deeks smiles like the idiot he is, causing Kensi to roll her eyes as Deeks turns to the speaker and says, "I need one offensively large vanilla milk shake, and then a more reasonably sized strawberry."

There's a momentary pause before the boy taking their order asks, "Is a twenty ounce reasonable?"

"A twenty ounce is perfectly reasonable," Deeks assures him before pulling forward.

Kensi leans back in the seat, arms crossed as she admits defeat. Sort of. "You can't make me feel better with a milk shake."

"No, but a milkshake will give you something else to focus on while I _try_ to make you feel better." He gives her a lopsided grin as he wrestles his wallet out of his pocket. "Although, it might be easier if you let me in on what it is that's bothering you exactly."

Kensi simply shakes her head and begins to pick at her nails.

Deeks lets her silence continue as he pays for the shakes. She surprises herself with a snorted laugh as the cashier hands Deeks the biggest Styrofoam cup she's ever seen. "Offensively large" is an accurate description.

"Where are we going now?" she asks, tearing the straw paper with her teeth as Deeks, once again, makes a turn heading away from the office.

"Not really sure," he admits, sounding as though he's thinking out loud. "Figured we'd just drive until we worked this out."

He looks to her, waiting for her to take the lead. She just looks forward, shaking her head as she closes her eyes. All she sees is the jerk of a body, feels the kick of her gun. And that just triggers the memory of all the others before.

It starts as a quiet gasp, a tightening of her chest. But then the tears are back, that urgent need to cry overpowering the need to breathe resulting in gasping, rib cracking sobs. She balances the milkshake between her legs and brings both hands up to cover her mouth. She makes an effort to stop the sobbing, but is simply rewarded with a snot echoed snort-hiccup combination that erupts from her throat.

She hasn't cried this hard since her father died.

She doesn't realize they've stopped moving until she feels the car turn off. She expects to feel Deeks reach for her, for him to give her a hug or at least a hand on her shoulder. But instead, he lets her cry in peace.

She forces herself to relax. Let's the tears come instead of trying to hold them back, and eventually her breathing evens out. She focuses on the cold seeping from the Styrofoam cup through her jeans, listens to the sounds of traffic and a man angrily yelling at someone on his phone.

Wiping her eyes with the heels of her palms, she looks around her, noticing that Deeks had pulled into the parking lot of motel.

"Did you know him?" Deeks whispers, capturing her attention.

"Who?" she asks, honestly confused for a brief second. Realizing he's talking about the target, a perfectly reasonable assumption considering what she went through with Jack and the White Ghost debacle, she quickly shakes her head. "No, I had never heard of him until today."

She watches as Deeks exhales a sigh, clearly relieved that that hadn't been the source of her distress. "Then….what?"

She shakes her head again, using her sleeve to wipe at her now running nose.

"I don't know," she lies, squeezing her eyes shut before blurting out the truth. "I was confident."

There's more silence, and she can't force herself to look at him. She chooses instead to push in the plastic tabs on the lid to her milkshake.

"Kens, you're gonna have to give me a little more than that."

She looks out the window, focusing on a middle-aged man wearing dark blue Crocs with ankle socks who's struggling to get his luggage into the back of his car. She stares at this man instead of looking at Deeks. "I was confident that I could kill him."

"There's nothing wrong with that," Deeks tries to assure her, "You're an excellent sniper. And you hit your target."

"I know!" she snaps, anger fueling her to turn and face her partner. "I'm good at it! And that's the problem."

Deeks just shakes his head in confusion.

"Deeks," she inhales through her nose, channeling her inner calm, "we're all a pretty talented group, right?"

He nods, but remains quiet.

"I just," she wipes away more tears, "I was sitting there watching him through the scope, _confident_ that I could take him, and I just…You're not supposed to be confident in your skill at taking someone's life."

"You make it sound like we're a bunch of serial killers," Deeks argues.

"No," she says, "No, it's just…I killed two people today. How about you?"

"One," he admits, "Injured another. But Kensi, it's part of the job—"

"What about this year? It's still early, how many have you killed this year? Since joining NCIS? Since becoming a cop?"

He reaches out, grabbing her wrist and squeezing. "It's different."

She relaxes her arm and lets him hold it. "How?"

"Our job puts us in the line of fire. Most days, it's kill or be killed."

"Today wasn't a kill or be killed situation," she points out.

"Today wasn't most days," he counters. "That man was responsible for thousands of deaths. He's been selling secrets to the highest bidder. There wasn't a single country who didn't have him on their hit list."

Kensi twists her wrist out of his grip, turns her hand and tangles her fingers with his. Quietly, she asks, "Doesn't it bother you?"

"Doesn't what bother me?"

"The fact that we're so good at it? At killing people?"

Deeks shrugs and squeezes her hand. "Yeah, it bothers me," he admits. "But that's what helps."

Kensi arches a brow, causing Deeks to smile. "If it didn't bother me, I'd be worried. No, scratch that. What I'd actually be is a sociopath."

Kensi rolls her eyes, but softens the blow with a grin. Deeks' smile widens and he leans forward, kissing the back of her hand before turning serious. "But Kens, we have to be good at it."

She wrinkles her brow, thrown by his change in demeanor, "Why?"

"Because they are too," he tells her, referring to the criminals they hunt. He points a finger towards the man fighting his luggage, "And if you think Mr. Crocs and Socks has a chance against the Bad Guys, then maybe you should hang up your gun."

She generally laughs as she watches the man argue with a clearly disinterested pair of children. "He'd be hopeless in a firefight."

Deeks gives her hand one final squeeze before letting go and starting the car. "But he's got you, and me, and the others to keep him safe. So, he doesn't even have to worry about it."

"It's never bothered me before," she says, worried of how things will be in the future.

"Have you ever thought about it before?" he asks, finally turning in the general direction of Headquarters.

"Not really. At least, not since the first few times." She remembers the first time her pulling a trigger had resulted in someone's death. "Hetty told me then that it would eventually get easier to handle, not easier to do."

Keeping his eyes on the road, one hand reaching for his milkshake, Deeks gives a lopsided shrug. "Morally, maybe. I don't see that ever getting easier. But physically…"

"Muscle memory," Kensi says, catching on to his train of thought. "Intuition, and reflex."

Deeks nods as he takes a sip. "There's a fraction of a second where my consciousness makes a decision, and then it's all physical."

"That's why we practice maneuvers so often, why we spend so much time at the gun range. Practice makes perfect."

"Why you continuously enjoy kicking my ass in hand to hand?"

"Nah," Kensi grins, finally picking up her own milkshake. "That's just fun."

She sips the shake, the time she spent in the middle of a breakdown having helped soften it enough that it's easily sipped through a straw. The cold hits her throat, and she immediately feels better.

"You gonna be okay?" Deeks asks, eyes still on the road.

She takes a few more sips as she thinks it over. The rules that govern her life and the decisions she makes while on the job are not as black and white as she would like them to be. But they're clear enough that she knows she can go forward without questioning her actions.

"Yeah, I'm gonna be fine." And they both know each other well enough to know that that's the truth.

End.

A/N: Okay, I've been suffering from the WORST case of writer's block. Seriously. 6 solid days of actively trying to come up with anything to write and I had nothing. Then my sister and I decided to write each other some "alphabet prompts" to maybe help get the juices going. For "K" she gave me killer and this was the end product. They kill a lot of people on that show. A lot. And I just couldn't help wondering if the characters were real, how they would react/justify the incredibly large number of lives that seem to end within the course of an NCIS investigation. It got a little angsty.

Blayne


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